The Daily JDA

I think the lull is real, but I also think the lull exists in the realm of the trendy. Startups focused on current trends in the web aren’t going to stand out. What really stands out to me is a startup that is not focused on the trends… Right now that’s xobni, a startup that is focusing on the email client when everyone else is focusing on the browser. By bucking the trend xobni is completely avoiding the lull.

xobni didn’t take the same approach of trying to build a social network from the ground up - xobni built off a tool that was already social in nature, but that completely lacked social features. That’s the pitch anyway, but I could honestly care less about the social aspects of xobni - I love it because it makes outlook interesting and more useful. Improved search, conversational organization, easy file view and most importantly - intelligent presentation of information (which might just be where the ‘plug-in’ company turns into a business).

xobni’s not predictable, it has nothing to do with the semantic web or the mobile web, it’s not the next facebook or the next google, it’s not something anyone said would be the next big thing - it’s not trendy, it’s just brilliant (though the micorsoft move may have been stupid (even if I do like the company more for it)).

Web >> Lull >> Web 2.0 >> Lull 2.0? >> Web 3.0?

I think we’ve hit a wall. Not that I haven’t said this before, but I think my viewpoint has changed a little. Before when I complained about an innovation downturn it was based on a lack of independent startups that I found to be interesting (there are plenty of good independents - but I still haven’t seen a lot of great ones lately). The problem as I see it now, is with a general sense of contentment with the largest “Web 2.0″ sites.

The problem with moving from Web 2.0 to Web 3.0 is that people just generally don’t care. They don’t think Google is broken, they don’t think Facebook is broken and generally they don’t care about the difference between machine readable and machine understandable. The difference between machine readable and machine understandable is the key difference in Web 2.0 and web 3.0 (well at least in one generally accepted understanding of 3.0) - if there isn’t demand, it’s tough to get supply. Most entrepreneurs, in my opinion, are focused on getting quick run away success with a quick exit. Tough to get quick run away success if people aren’t craving what you’re making.

I understand wanting to see some gain from the time put into your endeavor, but if we keep focusing on the same things we can’t move forward. It seems people have gotten used to using a certain set of web apps/sites and aren’t really looking for anything new. So, developers keep making the same things and making incremental gains. This has lead to an overall downturn - a downturn in innovation and not surprisingly a downturn in financial investment. We’re seeing small ideas, not big ideas. There’s a general sense of what people like and startups make copies and incremental changes.

I know I say this every five posts or so - but it’s not all gloom. There are some things that are exciting to me right now. Chief among them: mobile and microformats. The mobile web is really starting to take off - I honestly believe that personal web browsing (not business) will be conducted more on mobile devices than computers within 5 years. Microformats are exciting… or at least they could be. I’m excited about companies that are trying to interpret them, not those that are merely adding them to their sites (though that is important too). A downturn may even be good for the web. If the possibility of financial gain decreases, fewer people will try to create me-too startups and those that are creating truly innovative applications will once again stand out.

Of course, there is a chance that mobile and microformats really won’t take off. If you would have asked most people what they thought the next big wave in the web would be after the first crash my guess is most would not have said social applications.

What do you think? Is innovation slowing? Is it good?

I just read an article on wired about how Google is not doing very well monetizing social networks (synopsis: traditional Google ads don’t work on SNs). It’s a quick read and doesn’t say too much other than hinting that someone thinks there is an answer - but it’s a part of a very interesting problem. Despite the fact that social networks do a great job of getting users and keeping users on their sites for extended periods of time they haven’t really figured out the best way to turn users into dollars.

I won’t pretend to have the answer and I think it is different depending on the type of social network - a network that includes localized content obviously has different monetization opportunities than a network that has a more generalized focus. However, it seems to me that the focus really isn’t in the right place. Text ads work on search because they are almost the exact same thing a person is looking for when they do a search - if you’re searching you’re looking for links to relevant content, and that’s what text ads provide. When you’re on a social network you’re looking for information about people and things you care about. That’s not as easy to monetize - you can’t expect one of your “friends” to pay so that their photos are given priority over another one of your “friends.” It’s tough because you don’t care who views your content on most social networks that aren’t for businesses. This changes when you either have a social network that people are using for business, or when you let others develop on your platform. Let’s face it - I hate platforms - but I also think they might just be the best way to monetize social networks.

When facebook added the developer network and then the app platform they created something that they can get businesses to pay for. It’s all free now, but if Facebook charged fees for setting up apps, fees for premium placement of apps, a fee per user, or any other fee based on their apps platform - companies (and some people) would pay it. The true value of facebook NOW is it’s ability to expose new ideas to a large audience. You can’t monetize the content created by individuals for their “friend” individuals - you can monetize providing companies access to a huge network - and I won’t be surprised to see it.

But… what do you think?

When I think about the future of web apps, I think of remoteness. I think of being in one location and being able to both read and write to others. I want to setup a page of my own that allows me to interact with other sites in both for both retrieval and contribution. Imagine, a site where you can see your friends interactions with other sites and interact with those sites without leaving your current location. It’s not that hard to imagine… right now this type of ecosystem exists within the confines of Facebook, where, for example, I can update my twitter status and see others twitter updates without ever venturing to twitter itself. This is fine, but Facebook is not the internet… I’m essentially talking about a decentralized platform. So, what is Friend Feed? Well, probably a lot of people reading this already know, but for those that don’t… it’s the read part of the read write decentralized platform. We’ve reached a halfway point where I can read from other sites without having to visit them, but I can’t write to most of them unless they are contained somewhere. I want to be able to have a module that I control that allows me to post to Flickr, Facebook, or Delicious (not the best example) without having to visit the sites or go through an API. We’re at the point where we can read most content from nearly anywhere… next we need to be able to write. I might just do this with motask… enable people to take the site with them to anywhere else they want, even completely rebrand it… but contain the information within my database. I’m still working the details out… but with the simple nature of motask, it at least seems possible. There are many more examples where this is beginning to happen… but they are coming along slowly and all too often are left to the tech savvy. Somewhere between opensource and silo data lies the future of web interactivity, figuring out the right mix will determine the future of the web.